Larry Magid: Google Complies With European ‘Right To Be Forgotten’ Ruling

This picture taken on May 13, 2013 in the French western city of Rennes shows a woman choosing Google Search (or Google Web Search) web search engine front page on her tablet. A report by a French expert panel published on May 13, 2013 recommended imposing taxes on smartphones and tablets but rejected a call for search engine Google to be charged for linking to media content. The nine-member panel, headed by respected journalist and businessman Pierre Lescure, said in the keenly awaited report that the revenue gained from the proposed new taxes could help fund artistic and creative ventures. AFP PHOTO / DAMIEN MEYER (Photo credit should read DAMIEN MEYER/AFP/Getty Images)

Google (credit: DAMIEN MEYER/AFP/Getty Images)

SAN FRANCISCO (KCBS)— Google is taking the first step in complying with a European court ruling that gives people the right to be forgotten online.

This started with a Spanish individual who complained because he was very upset that news about his bankruptcy from 15-years ago was still searchable on the Internet, with some high visibility if you searched it through Google.

Essentially the European Union Court of Justice (sort of an equivalent to the U.S. Supreme Court) ruled that Google had to take down the listing to that page. The newspaper’s website didn’t have to take the actual page down, but Google would have to make it less searchable.

This is precedent setting in that people can now petition to be forgotten on the web in a sense. Anyone who lives in one of 32 European countries (the U.S. is not one of them) can now log on to a web page that Google is providing and tell them why they think a link should be taken down from the search engine. If it qualifies by Google’s standards, the company will supposedly remove it.

Google Complies With European ‘Right To Be Forgotten’ Ruling

We all have things in our own history that we’re not particularly proud of, but that’s just it. It is history. Really this is just a false sense of security because the items in question are still there and there will be other ways to find them. Just because Google is complying doesn’t mean search engines across the board are going to do the same.

Google has said politicians won’t be able to erase their past, but still, as a journalist this kind of wrangles me. I don’t want Google making editorial decisions, they’re a search engine. They shouldn’t be deciding on the value of content they should simply provide it if it’s out there. (There are exceptions with child pornography and other illegal content).

This whole notion is kind of like shredding a newspaper with bad press in it and pretending the story doesn’t exist. I don’t think this is the right solution.

Larry Magid is a technology journalist and an Internet safety advocate.
He serves as on-air technology analyst for CBS News, is co-director of ConnectSafely.org and founder of SafeKids.com. He also writes columns that appear on CNET New...